IPEN

At IPEN's booth at the Minamata Convention's 1st Conference of the Parties, IPEN is taking hair samples from all those interested in testing for mercury levels. The samples will be sent to Biodiversity Research Institute's laboratories for mercury analysis and results will be reported on in the coming months. Some delegates who previously gave hair samples at the Convention's 1st Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee meeting in Sweden in 2010 are interested in getting their hair tested again to see if their levels have changed.

On the first day of the conference, IPEN also tested some skin creams for mercury levels, including creams purchased in Bangladesh, Benin and India. Read more about IPEN's activities at the COP1 here.

EcoWaste Coalition and Laban Konsyumer, Inc. Joint Press Release

Government Urged to Go After Importers, Distributors and Retailers of Toxic Cosmetics

Quezon City: Chemical safety and consumer protection groups today revealed the unabashed trade of mercury-containing skin whitening products despite being illegal to import, distribute and sell.

The EcoWaste Coalition and Laban Konsyumer, Inc. made the exposé ahead of the first Conference of Parties (COP1) to the Minamata Convention on Mercury on September 24 to 29 in Geneva, Switzerland.

The Minamata Convention, an international treaty, aims “to protect the human health and the environment from anthropogenic releases of mercury and mercury compounds.”  Among other things, it targets the phase-out of skin lightening products with mercury above one part per million (ppm).

Fish samples from hot spots in Thailand contain toxic mercury

In the nearest future, we expect a major and important event for all of us - the First Conference of the Parties of the Minamata Convention on Mercury. We invested a lot of effort into the development and promotion of the Convention. We congratulate all people who facilitated the event by their work, knowledge and devotion!

The Minamata Convention on Mercury prioritises environmental considerations over interests of global businesses used to pursue their financial gains in a resource-based economy that ignores environmental effects. It is not only associated with banning primary mercury extraction from global deposits, it also deals with tightening control over different industrial operations, particularly with extraction and processing non-ferrous metals ores, that are accompanied by uncontrolled releases of many tons of mercury into the environment.